


Hydrogen

by 7PercentSolution



Series: Periodic Tales [2]
Category: Sherlock (TV)
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-07-08
Updated: 2016-07-08
Packaged: 2018-07-22 10:07:52
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 3
Words: 4,047
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7431894
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/7PercentSolution/pseuds/7PercentSolution
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Hydrogen H 1.00794</p><p>The first element on the Periodic Table. Discovered in 1766. Its name means "water-former". The lightest element and the most abundant, it constitutes 75% of the mass of the universe. It is the stuff of stars, the catalyst of bombs and the beginning of everything.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

 

**Part One:**

**H(1) also called Protium; atomic Hydrogen is the most common form of hydrogen. It has one proton and no neutrons.**

* * *

The relief nurse looked at the young boy. She was new to this ward, only started this week. She would be providing maternity cover for the night nurse, who was talking her through her charges. This boy had been in care now for eighteen weeks, originally admitted for depression following the death of his mother ten days after his tenth birthday. He had been also diagnosed as emotional labile, developmentally damaged and experiencing communication regression. He had not spoken once while at the hospital, and his anti-social behaviours had become exaggerated during his time in care, so the diagnosis was not encouraging. The usual round of anti-depressants and other drugs to treat his symptoms were having limited effect. Actually, in some case, the effects had been paradoxical. That had led the psychiatrist down an unorthodox route, which was beginning to have some benefits. At least, he'd stopped crying all of the time.

Angela, the night nurse continued her description, "He doesn't sleep properly, I am afraid. Epileptiform at Dream stage IV, so is awake at odd times in the night. Hasn't seized yet, but who knows when it might start. When he gets anxious, I've taken to reading from the book he keeps with him all the time. It seems to calm him down."

She looked at it on the bedside table. It was called  _Building Blocks of the Universe,_  by Isaac Asimov.  _Wasn't he a science fiction writer?_ They went on to the next bed- a little girl with cerebral palsy who had broken her leg quite severely, and Angela started giving her the details.

oOo

"How did you first get interested in the periodic table? Did you learn it in school?" John tried to remember when he'd first come across it- probably when he started at the local comprehensive school. He'd not thought much of it at the time; he was more interested in biology, but that might have been because he was lab partners with Caroline Jones, whose giggle he found positively infectious when he was thirteen and a half.

"My mother gave a book about the periodic table for my tenth birthday. And I read it over, and over, until I knew everything that was in the book. I decided to become a scientist then."

"I thought you wanted to be a pirate when you were young." John had heard that from Mycroft. Sherlock did not answer; he seemed lost in thought.


	2. Chapter 2

**Part Two**

**H(2) Molecular Hydrogen, also known as Deuterium, the second isotope when combined with oxygen through combustion yields water.**

* * *

It was Nurse Anne Lowery's third night shift, and it wasn't going well. The boy was shouting and he had woken up several of the others on the ward, who were now in a right state. She had tried to get him to identify what it was that was bothering him.  _But when you can't or won't speak, that's not easy._ She'd tried to talk soothingly to him, even tried a lullaby. When they woke up in unfamiliar surroundings and in pain, a calming voice and a maternal kind of sympathy often helped to steady them; it usually put the little ones back to sleep.

Not this boy. She'd learned the names of her ward charges quickly, and his stood out as one of the oddest.  _Sherlock – his parents should have known better; he'll be bullied about his name for years._  Mind you, he wasn't responding at all to her use of it. He wasn't shouting words; not screaming, just noises. He didn't appear to be in pain, just really angry and thrashing about. She'd realised as soon as she touched him that it only seemed to make matters worse, so she let go. She went back to the nurses' station and put a call into the duty doctor. "I need some sedation down here; the Holmes boy is just freaking out." He said he'd be down as soon as he could, but there was an urgent case of appendicitis that took priority.

She went back to his bed where the boy was now rocking violently, making the metal bars along the left side smack into the wall with a bang every time he threw his weight against it. That's when she spotted the book on the bedside cabinet. What was it Angela had said? She'd read to him to calm him down. She pulled up a chair and opened the book. To her surprise, it wasn't fiction; it was a science book.

She opened to the first page and started to read, " _When scientists talk of matter, they mean anything at all that has weight- a rock, a human being, a book a pail of sea water, or an automobile, Almost anything else you can name, including the sun, the moon, and the stars, is matter…_

By the time she had reached the end of the introduction's four pages, the rocking had stopped. As she turned over the page, she took a stealthy look at him. He was listening. Not looking, no- this one did not ever make eye contact. But, he was staring at the ceiling as if not seeing it, but something else.  _Or someone else?_ She knew that his mother had been his principal carer and that she had died recently of pancreatic cancer.

" _Hydrogen was given its modern name by Lavoisier who called it after the Greek words meaning ' giving rise to water'."_

She looked over again, and saw that Sherlock's face was wet with tears.

oOo

After months of living with Sherlock, John's own powers of observation improved dramatically. He had learned, for example, the measure and character of Sherlock's mood simply by the nature of the chemistry experiments he performed. There were those conducted intensely but quickly- these generally related to an active case, where he needed an answer quickly, in order to prove or disprove one or more of his working theories. Be it an exercise of finding out how long it took for stomach acid to breakdown a particular piece of candy or learning how quickly bruises would emerge on an already dead cadaver- these were usually undertaken at speed and with an intensity bordering on fanatical. John knew better than to interrupt at any point. Indeed, he'd even been roped into a few.

"John. Please provide a urine sample, a man's life depends on it _._ " A hand with a glass beaker appeared in front of john's chest, but Sherlock's head did not lift from the microscope.

John frowned. He was on his way from the kitchen to his chair to drink a cup of tea he'd just made. "Why don't you do it? What's wrong with  _your_  pee?"

"I'm not the one drinking six cups of tea a day; you must have volume to spare."

When John headed off to the bathroom, Sherlock's baritone followed him- "Make it a mid-stream clean catch please!" John muttered as he obliged, "I do know basic testing procedures, thank you very much."

When the doctor came back from the bathroom carrying the beaker, he asked "What are you going to do with it?"

"I will heat it to drive off the water and examine what remains." He looked bemused. The one John had provided was a light yellow, but there was another one on the table that was much darker, in a standard medical sample bottle.

John's forehead creased. "Is that someone  _else's_  pee?"

"Yes- my client's." It turned out that the victim of the attempted murder had given a medical sample about an hour before he fell ill. "Clearly, he doesn't drink as much tea in a day as you do." Sherlock smirked. "Human urine is usually 95% water, with organic solutes including urea, creatinine, uric acid, and trace amounts of enzymes, carbohydrates, hormones, fatty acids and mucins; then there's the inorganic ions- sodium, chloride, magnesium, calcium, ammonium, sulfates and phosphates. But I'm after the potassium content, because I think someone gave him a lethal dose and caused the heart attack that nearly killed him."

He poured the John's beaker into the flask, and lit the burner. "Yours should show a concentration of about three quarters of a gram of potassium per litre. Once I isolate the potassium in his sample, then I can also see if there is a contaminant in there with it which will give a clue as to how it was ingested."

John smiled. "Whatever keeps a client alive and you happy, Sherlock."

oOo

He was less amused when he watched some of his possessions disappear, as experimental material.

"John, it was necessary to see how fast your wool jumper caught fire compared to that acrylic sweater Harry gave you, which you hate and have never worn; the rate of combustion determined which brother was the killer."

"But that wool sweater was my  _favourite._ "

"Sometimes sacrifices need to be made for the good of society." He smirked, knowing full well what was about to come in reply.  _Three...two...one..._

"Yeah, as if you cared about that," followed by a long suffering sigh.

Then there were the more sedate experiments- usually conducted on some body part dragged home from Barts, courtesy of Molly, on which various odd tests were performed. Bags of thumbs, jars of eyeballs, Tupperware boxes of gall bladders took up space in the fridge and kept him busy when the case work dried up. Sherlock wrote up results and posted them on his blog, or occasionally in some publication or another, such as  _Forensic Science International_  or  _Journal of Forensic and Legal Medicine_. These were worthy exercises and kept Sherlock occupied for hours as he tested and re-tested to get statistically significant findings that would hold up under academic peer scrutiny. Excruciatingly dull in John's eyes, but, hey- if it kept the mad scientist busy and out of trouble, then it was fine by the doctor.

"Sherlock , you're going to get curvature of the spine from bending over your microscope for so long. You realise that you've been at that same experiment for the past seven hours?"

"Time flies when you're having fun."

OoO

Time doesn't move when you're in hospital. The boy had lost all sense of time. He knew he arrived one week, three days and twelve hours after he was told his mother died. But, he no longer had any idea how many weeks, days, hours, minutes and seconds had passed since then. That made him anxious, because sometimes he liked counting the time and knowing what was supposed to happen at each moment. It made him feel safe. He didn't feel safe here. It was strange.

Mycroft was the one who told him that mummy died. His father didn't. He must have known, because Mycroft said mummy died on Sunday. His brother told him this on Tuesday. So father had been home in the house with Sherlock for two days and not told him. He hadn't spoken to him at all during that time, and Sherlock was glad. He didn't like Father. He made him feel anxious and then he made mistakes, and they both got angry. Sherlock had developed an innate sense of knowing just where his father was going to be in the house, and avoiding that place.

oOo

"When?"

Mycroft looked at his brother, who wouldn't look him in the eye. He thought that telling Sherlock about mummy's death was perhaps the hardest thing he'd ever done in his seventeen years. He was angry that his father made him be the one to tell Sherlock, but he also understood why. "The boy never speaks to me; at least he talks  _at_ you." And he knew that his father blamed Sherlock in some way for exhausting their mother in her final months. So, he agreed to tell his brother.

"On Sunday, at the hospital. She passed away in her sleep. She was on morphine, so not in any pain."

Sherlock flapped his hand. "When,  _exactly_."

"2.58am." He wondered about his brother's need for precision. Time mattered to him in ways that Mycroft didn't quite understand. Sometimes he had to know exactly; other times, he didn't even know what day of the week it was.

"Who will read with me now?"

It was so matter-of-fact that it just took Mycroft a moment to process. "Sherlock, do you understand that Mummy won't be coming back?"

"Yes, of course. She's dead. When things die, they don't come back. No matter what the vicar says on Sundays."

"The funeral will be held in four days' time."

"On Saturday."

"Yes. We need the time to let all the family and friends know so they can attend."

"Why?"

"Do you mean why are we holding a funeral? You  _know_  what a funeral is; we all went to Aunt Ingri's last year, in Oslo, remember?

"No, why are  _they_  attending?"

"Because people want to pay their last respects."

"What does that mean?"

"People who loved mummy want to celebrate her life and say goodbye, to share their grief."

"I don't understand."

Mycroft just looked very sad and blinked away the tears. He'd promised his mother that he would be strong for Sherlock.


	3. Chapter 3

**Part Three**

**H(3)**   **Tritium, the third isotope of Hydrogen**.  **With one proton and two neutrons, it is radioactive and a by-product released as a result of the destructive power of nuclear weapons tests.**

* * *

Mycroft's heavy footsteps could be heard as he walked down the seventeen steps back to the front door. Sherlock's face was set like stone, and the air positively crackled with supressed rage. John had just witnessed an argument of toxic violence dressed up in the polite words exchanged between two adults who both want to hurt one another, but who are also beyond punching each other out.

"Why do you two get on so badly, Sherlock?" John just frowned. "I get the feeling that there is a lot of history between the two of you, and I'm not prying, but…Jeez, you two ought to issue an alert that a bomb's about to go off when you really get going. With some warning, I'd head for the bunker and get out of the blast radius if I knew what was coming."

Sherlock moved his glare from the doorway to John's face. "You and Harry aren't exactly 'best mates', so why do you assume I should get on with that fat git?"

John wondered if Sherlock was right. Was he being fair? He and Harry had fought like cats and dogs when they were kids, and when their parents were gone, and she started hitting the bottle, their arguments had escalated. Was the level of animosity between the Holmes brothers any worse?

"Actually, I'm no saint here, but there is a difference of degree in what you and Mycroft throw at each other that makes it truly awful. I guess as kids Harry and me didn't get on, and as adults we fight dirty with words, when hair pulling and pinching used to be enough. But…you two? Well, you elevate a family dispute into a thermonuclear war. Harry and me chuck grenades; you and Mycroft slug it out with hydrogen bombs. Someone's going to get hurt."

Sherlock looked at his flatmate in surprise. "Whatever gave you the impression that we didn't want to hurt each other?"

oOo

The day before the funeral, the house started to fill up with family and friends. A woman arrived and was introduced to Sherlock by his father. "She's here to look after you." Just being in the room with his father made him nervous, and he wouldn't look at the woman's face. He didn't know her; he didn't like new people. They frightened him. She smelled funny.

That night he had a seizure- just a mild one, he didn't even wet the bed. But the strange woman came in and turned on the light, which made him scream, and then curl up in a ball. She was talking at him, but he ignored her and then he felt his face was wet and he'd started to cry. The whimpers turned into sobs, and then into gasps as he couldn't seem to catch his breath, and that made him even more frightened, so he kept crying. Once he got started, he didn't know how to stop.

Mycroft heard the noise and came in, told the nurse to go away, and turned off the light. He sat in the chair by the bed. "I'm here, Sherlock. Just try to do this quietly, or father will wake up." The little boy's sobs seemed to diminish in volume, but they didn't stop. Listening to his brother finally broke the dam that had held Mycroft's own emotions in check, and the sound of his own crying merged with that of his brother.

He'd been strong until then. When he'd taken his mother's call in the first week of November and she asked him to meet her in London for tea, he'd been pleased at the opportunity to see her. It was his first term at Balliol College and he was finding Oxford to be everything that he had hoped it would be. His weekly one-to-one tutorial sessions with some of the most distinguished academics were stretching his mind, pushing him to new levels of understanding. The PPE* degree was  _so_  interesting; the lectures might be a bit boring as he already knew most of what they covered, but he'd joined the Oxford Union straight away and was enjoying the debates immensely. There were so many interesting things going on. He was meeting a lot of new people, making contacts who he knew would be useful later on.

He'd spent the hour long train ride from Oxford to Paddington Station thinking about what he'd tell his mother about his first term. That all changed the moment he laid eyes on her in the Palm Court at the Langham Hotel on Great Portland Street. She looked ill and exhausted, but when she saw him her face lit up with a wonderful smile.

"Hello, darling. Give me a kiss, and then sit here. I've ordered you a lunch. I hope you won't mind eating it on your own, but I'm just not hungry at the moment."

She asked him about Oxford, and he tried to tell her as he tucked into his lunch, but the enthusiasm he'd had on the train waned.  _What is it she's not telling me? Maybe Father's finally asked for a divorce?_

So Mycroft asked when Father was planning on getting back from his latest business trip to the Far East, as a way of giving her a chance to introduce the subject.

"Oh, it won't be for another couple of weeks. He's working so hard right now on that pharmaceutical factory project in Singapore, I know he wants to finish it so he won't have to go back before Christmas."

He picked at his lunch as he waited for her to tell him what was wrong. He was worrying now that maybe something had happened to Sherlock, so he actually missed the first part of what she said once his plate was cleared away. Then his brain caught up,"… had a few tests done and I'm so sorry to have to tell you that the doctors say it is inoperable pancreatic cancer."

His face must have betrayed his horror. She looked at him gently. "Now Mycroft, I know that it's a bit of a shock, but you're old enough to cope with this without making a scene in public."

He tried to concentrate on not losing his lunch, embarrassing himself and his mother. He struggled to find some words. "Does Father know?"  _No, of course not; despite his affairs, he'd be on the next plane if he knew; why did I ask that? Stupid!_

She just looked at him.

Mycroft blushed at his own stupidity. "Of course, not. You want him to finish this…work so he can be home for an extended period."

She reached across the table and put her hand over his. "It won't be  _that_  extended, my dear. The doctors say it will happen very quickly. I shall be lucky to spend Christmas with you all. That's my goal anyway."

He looked away from the table for a moment and watched the other people eating their lunches. Happy people, families, couples, even a few people on their own- none of whom were dealing with what he was trying to understand. A nuclear explosion had just gone off in his life.  _My mother is dying._  Then he stifled a noise erupting from him, closed his eyes and tried to get a grip.

When he opened them, he looked into her blue eyes.  _Everyone has always said that I take after father, except that my eyes are like hers_.

"Surely there must be treatments- chemotherapy, drugs... You need to tell Father; his companies must have some experimental protocols, something that hasn't been released yet. You have to tell him  _now_  so he can find something." He realised his voice was breaking and he was losing control of his breathing.

"I'm so sorry Mycroft. I know this is awful for you. It's no good. The doctors can only offer palliative care; something to ease the pain when it gets really bad. But it's too late. I'm already in Stage Four and it's metastasising like mad, apparently- already in my gall bladder and liver. The surprising thing is that I haven't actually felt terrible for more than a couple of weeks- just thought I'd strained my back…" That's when Mycroft realised why she might have thought that; she was the only one that his brother allowed to touch him, to pick him up.

"Oh God, Mummy- does Sherlock know?"

This was the first time that her own eyes betrayed her, and she looked down at their hands on the table. Quietly, she said "No. Oh, he knows I've been tired and unwell, but doesn't understand why. And I'm not going to tell him, nor are you, and your father won't either, if I have any say in it. I want to be able to enjoy this last Christmas without having him distressed. He's made so much progress, really. You will be so pleased when you see him again."

"I'm coming home with you now. I don't want to go back to Oxford. I can suspend my studies for a year. It's not too late to do that."

"No, I won't have you looking at me the way you are right now, darling. I don't think I can cope with the idea of watching you watching me go downhill. It will be hard enough to deal with Sherlock. With you at home, he'd know something is wrong. You're not  _that_  good an actor, Mycroft, and he is amazingly perceptive at times, you know that. And, anyway, you are doing so well at Balliol, I won't let this stop you. You'll just have to be strong. You can come home for some weekends, if you really want to, but it's only another six weeks until the Christmas break anyway. We can talk on the phone, if you'd like, every day, if that's important to you."

 _If that's important to me…every moment you have left is important to me; don't you realise that?_ He didn't feel at all grown up. He wanted nothing more than to run out of the room, hide himself in the gents and cry his eyes out. If he'd been anywhere other than in a public place….  _Of course, that's why she decided to tell me here. So I wouldn't do that. She wants me to be brave._

He drew a deep breath and set his face. "Mummy, I'll try to do whatever you need me to do."

That brought a smile to her face. "Thank you, Mycroft; I really, really need this from you. I think neither your father nor your brother will be able to handle this well. You and I – we'll talk –lots- there are so many things that need to get sorted, and I will need your help."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Author's Note:  
> *PPE degree is a BA (Honours) programme unique to Oxford and the letters stand for Politics, Philosophy and Economics. Balliol College is renowned for its politics faculty and has three UK Prime Ministers and countless numbers of civil servants among its alumni.


End file.
